


Private Eye

by Kalliste



Category: Generation Kill
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, M/M, Surprise Pairing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-11
Updated: 2012-02-11
Packaged: 2017-10-30 22:41:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/336995
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kalliste/pseuds/Kalliste
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes, mysteries decide to solve themselves.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Private Eye

**Author's Note:**

> This story is a work of fiction, based on the fictionalized characters in the HBO miniseries  _Generation Kill_. No reflection on the real people bearing these names is implied. No profit is being made and no harm is intended.

  


These stories are _supposed_ to always start with a woman, preferably beautiful, definitely mysterious.

In my case, though, I suppose two out of three will have to do.

Walt would probably laugh himself sick to hear himself called _mysterious_ , of course, but _I_ sure as hell can’t figure him out. So I decide to ask him.

“So what’s your story anyway, Hasser?” I say, making sure to sound like I don’t care about the answer. I curl my fingers around the glass of single malt in front of me, the liquid murky-looking in the cool gloom of the nearly deserted bar. The rattle and bang of automobiles chugging by outside is faint in here, easily ignorable. The one grimy window in the joint is level with the street above, showing the ankles of the men and women walking by in the low afternoon light. Busy, hardworking folk, no doubt, grateful to be employed in these days when there’s no guarantee of that at all. I mentally offer them all a rude gesture.

Walt puts down the glass he’s been polishing for the last ten minutes and flips his towel over his shoulder with a sunny grin. His shirt gleams, pristine and white, against the dark material of his tight-fitted vest and sleeve garters. His shirt is the cleanest thing in this dump by a long shot, including the glass. And me.

“Story?” he asks, doing that innocent cherub thing he does so well. I don’t buy it for a second. “What makes you think I got one?”

I grunt sourly. “Everyone’s got a story, Hasser.”

“Including you?”

I give him a look. Most folks get a little nervous when I give them looks, but Walt’s grin only widens, and he holds his hands up in a placating gesture that manages to be mocking without being offensive. Maybe because it’s hard to imagine Walt doing anything truly offensive, with his big blue eyes and wholesome, sweet face. Not that I’d been taking stock.

“Okay, okay,” he says. “I got a story, sure. But the question ain’t whether a person’s got a story,” he goes on, leaning against the back bar and crossing his arms, “the question’s whether their story is something anyone else gives a damn about listenin’ to.”

It’s somehow startling to hear him cuss. I raise an eyebrow, pretending to be disapproving, and Walt snorts derisively. And given the mouth on me most days, I can’t really blame him.

“I think the story of how a corn-fed Virginia farm boy ends up tending bar at the seediest dive on the South Side must be of interest to _someone_ ,” I say.

I expect him to be surprised that I’ve figured out where he’s from, but Walt only tilts his head. “Someone like you?” he asks, and does he have to keep flipping everything back onto me all the time?

Damn bartenders. Worse than shrinks, I swear.

“I’m professionally curious,” I tell him dismissively. “Occupational hazard.” _And that’s all_ , I hope I’ve conveyed. A man can’t be too careful.

“Uh-huh,” he says, not sounding particularly convinced.

It’s clearly time to go. I stand, trying not to make it too abrupt, shrug on my coat, and toss two dollars on the bar. Walt’s eyebrows go up, and I know it’s far too extravagant a tip, but I don’t feel like waiting around for change.

“Thanks for the drink,” I say, settling my hat on my head.

Walt gives me a look I decide not to examine too closely, but all he says is, “Anytime, Brad.”

  


* * *

  


I decide I’m not going back there.

Not like it’s a hardship; not like there aren’t a million other dives in this town to choose from if I want to drown my sorrows.

Maybe I’ll go to one of _those_ bars instead. The ones no one talks about, but everyone knows where they are. I’d been in one before, but that had been for a case, and I’d got the hell out as soon as I could. Made me feel… itchy.

But maybe… no.

No. I just won’t go back to that one. That’s all.

  


* * *

  


“Didn’t know if I’d see you here again,” Walt commented, sliding my whiskey across the bar.

I watch the glass, not him. “Don’t know why,” I say. “I’ve been coming to this dump longer than you’ve been working here.”

There’s a pause from the other side of the bar, but I don’t look up. “You got me there,” Walt says, finally.

I let myself relax a bit, then; Walt wasn’t going to push it. Then out of nowhere a warm hand comes down on top of mine, and I look up to see his blue eyes inches away and it’s all I can do to restrain a jerk of surprise.

“This one’s on the house, Brad,” he says, for once not smiling at all, face utterly serious and – something, and then he’s gone, down the bar, tending to another patron with his customary sunny smile like nothing happened. I’m not sure whether anything did.

I look back down at the bar. I can still feel where his hand touched mine, and something seems to squeeze in my chest, sending sharp warm prickles everywhere.

I remember this feeling. I don’t trust it.

I leave after one more drink, once again over-tipping in spite of myself. Walt doesn’t say anything else to me besides a cordial goodbye, but I imagine I feel his gaze on my back as I go out the door and up the stairs to the street.

I imagine I feel it most of the way back home.

  


* * *

  


I’m really not going back this time. It’s too dangerous. I’m reading it all wrong, that look Walt gave me, because surely things don’t work that way.

Not for me.

  


* * *

  


It’s less than an hour to closing time when I walk in. Walt looks up from the bar at the sound of the door, and his blue eyes sharpen on me. I don’t ever come in this late, he knows; I like to do my drinking in the afternoons. He knows that too.

_Risky, risky_ , I hear in the back of my head, as I had been hearing for days. But then it had occurred to me to wonder: what, exactly, is it that I’m risking?

Questions without answers are my stock in trade, but they usually don’t hit this close to home.

I slide onto a stool, glancing around casually. There’s a couple murmuring together in a corner booth, heads close, almost touching, and a red-faced drunk at the end of the bar, swaying slowly over his glass as if to some lugubrious waltz only he can hear. Otherwise the bar is deserted.

A glass appears before me like magic, and I watch it intently as whiskey fills it with a silky, liquid sound. Only when Walt stops pouring, and places the bottle gently next to my glass on the bar, do I look up and meet his eyes.

I hadn’t figured out, when I walked in, how to say something, how to indicate that if what Walt was offering was what I thought it was, that I wanted it. I have no notion of these steps; I can’t even be sure that we’re dancing.

But apparently, I don’t need to say a word. Walt meets my eyes, and after a moment that seems to last years even though it was probably less than two seconds, a smile breaks across his face, like the sun through clouds. It’s his same bright smile as always, and yet… not.

This is a smile just for me.

I should probably be worried at how that makes my breath hitch in my chest. I watch him see it happen, watch his eyes soften and his smile turn, if possible, even more delighted, and I have to drop my gaze to the glass between us before I do something insane like lunge over the bar and…

I pick up the whiskey, down it in one swallow, close my eyes against the sweet burn. I hear the bottle clink again against the glass, more whiskey poured, but I don’t open my eyes until I feel the _whisk_ of displaced air against my face as Walt moves away.

I open my eyes to see him ducking under the bar counter at the far end to approach the couple in the booth. He murmurs something indistinct to them, and a moment later they are cheerfully donning coats and gloves and leaving money on the table. Walt moves on to the sot at the other end of the bar as the couple heads for the door, arms around waists, giggling and whispering together. There’s not much doubt about how their night is going to end.

That’s one mystery cleared up, then.

“C’mon, Philip, time to go home,” Walt says to the drunk, kindly. Philip mutters something unintelligible, and Walt helps him off the stool, catching him just before the man falls over. He pulls out Philip’s wallet and extracts a dollar, which can’t possibly have covered Philip’s tab judging from his degree of inebriation, and wrestles him gently into his coat and hat before guiding him to the door.

The bell above the door jingles as Walt closes it behind Philip, firmly. He twists the switch which makes the tiny dim sign at the top of the stairs lose what little illumination it had, and snaps the deadbolt to, and we are alone in the bar.

I’ve twisted around on my stool to watch him, and he turns to face me. He watches me for a moment, then smiles again, crookedly.

“Drink your drink, Brad,” he says.

He bustles off, picking up glasses, straightening chairs. I turn back to the bar and drink my drink, slowly, in measured sips, listening to him move around. I feel oddly weightless. I feel as if I’ve sailed off the edge of the map, and now only Walt knows where we’re going.

I’ve lost control of this, utterly. I should be upset about that.

I’m not.

It takes Walt maybe ten minutes to close the place down, and I can’t decide if the time feels far too long or not nearly long enough. I make my whiskey last, and just as I’ve taken my last sip, draining the glass, I feel a warm hand again, this time at my waist, exerting pressure to swivel my stool around to face him. I put down my glass and let it happen.

The world seems to fall silent as Walt gently pushes my knees apart so he can move between them, the small sounds amplified: the brush of his hand across the fabric of my pants, the soft susurration of his breathing, the slight creak of the leather stool as I shift position. With me sitting down, we’re the same height, eyes level. He stands before me, chest an inch from mine, and watches my eyes carefully as he reaches up to cradle my face in his hands, looking to see whether I’m going to pull back, shy away.

I don’t move, just return his gaze as steadily as I can. I wonder if he can hear how my heart is thundering in my chest.

He smiles again, just a little, and leans in to press his lips to mine with a sigh. Of relief, maybe? I don’t know.

The kiss begins chaste, just his soft lips meeting mine, but it doesn’t stay that way for long. Without even deciding to, I tilt my head, lips opening, and then Walt’s tongue is sliding between them and there’s a deep groaning sound that I realize came from me, and I slip my arms around his waist and crush him to me as the kiss turns messy and desperate, and I feel it all the way down to my toes, a hot, buzzing thrum of desire.

I feel the hot line of his erect cock pressing against me, and move my hands down from his waist, grasping and pulling in, grinding his hardness against mine even as our tongues move, slipping together, apart, back. Walt breaks the kiss to let out a groan of his own, riding with my thrusts, returning in kind. The edge of the bar is digging into my back with each movement, but I don’t care. All I want is more, harder, _Walt_.

“Brad,” Walt says, thickly, and another jolt of lust spikes through me at how hoarse he sounds. “Let me,” he says, and his hand is at my belt buckle, tugging it loose. My tongue is too thick in my mouth for speech, so I just nod and slide forward a bit on the stool, giving him access. I close my eyes as I feel him sliding the belt free of its loops, opening my pants; I groan as I feel him slip a hand inside and draw my cock free, stroke along its rock-hard length. My head tilts back of its own accord as my hips pump into his fist, and I feel a moment later his tongue on my throat, tracing my Adam’s apple.

“My God, you should see yourself,” Walt whispers into my ear, a moment before gently biting down on the lobe. One of his hands is under my shirt, fingernails scraping across a nipple, while the other hand never ceases its relentless stroking. I try to respond, to reciprocate, something, but all I can do is writhe and pant under him, helpless under the waves of pleasure he’s coaxing out of me effortlessly.

“So beautiful, falling apart for me,” Walt murmurs, his hand pumping faster. “Will you come for me, Brad? Just for me?”

I respond to his words as if I’d been given an order. My breath punches out of me all at once, and my spine bows forward with the force of my orgasm. Walt strokes me through it, coaxing it all out of me, until I slump bonelessly back against the bar, panting like I’d run for miles.

From what seems like a thousand miles away, I feel Walt’s lips curve in a smile against my skin, and then he leans past me to reach over the bar. A moment later I feel a soft wet cloth wiping me clean, and have to grin a tiny bit at Walt’s preparedness.

He tucks me back in and fastens my pants, and I finally open my eyes to find him watching me with a sort of serious delight, where the smile is in his eyes instead of his mouth.

“Thank you,” he says.

I blink, puzzled. I was pretty sure I should be thanking _him_ , not the other way around. Walt sees the look, and the corner of his mouth twitches.

“For trusting me,” he clarifies. He strokes a hand down my cheek. “I know it’s not something you’re big on.”

Oh. I trap his hand against my cheek with my own, and lean forward, capture his mouth again. Walt sighs into the kiss, sounding contented even though I can still feel how hard he is. I reach down, intending to return the favor, but Walt’s other hand stops me, and he breaks the kiss to say, “Wait.”

My heart drops into my stomach. “But – don’t you want – ” Why would he – if he didn’t –

Walt’s eyes widen at whatever he sees on my face, and he pulls both his hands free to grab my shoulders. “Brad, no, I do want, very much,” he says, forcefully, eyes boring into mine. I swallow, unprepared for the intensity I see in his gaze. “I’ve wanted for – but not here.”

He takes a breath and looks down, suddenly shy. “I mean, this is – but I want you – I want you in my bed,” he finishes in a rush. “If you – if you want.”

Oh. I reach out, tentatively, and tilt his chin up so he’s looking at me again. Walt gazes at me, open and heartbreakingly sincere and, incredibly, nervous, as if he expects – oh.

“Okay,” I say.

Walt blinks, almost comically surprised. “Okay?”

“Yes,” I tell him. “Okay.” I feel my lips curve in an entirely involuntary smile. The smile feels strange on my face; has it really been that long since I’d worn one?

Walt’s eyes are fixed on my mouth, and he looks dazed for some reason. But only for a moment; then his own grin breaks out in return, and a confused mélange of associated images run through my mind at the sight: green grass and golden fields and bright sunlight, things which have no place at all in this dingy bar, in this grimy city.

Except they do, because Walt is here, and he wants to take me home.

He beams at me with that dazzling smile, and tugs me off the stool, toward the door. I grab my hat and follow without a qualm.

Mystery solved.

 

**END**

**Author's Note:**

> I started this about a million years ago in response to a prompt somewhere that I can't find anymore, but was something like "Brad/Walt, 1930s AU", and this is the result, since my main mental association with the 1930s is gritty private detective noir-type things told in first person. I stopped writing it about halfway through months ago and almost forgot all about it, but of course there's something else I'm supposed to be working on right now, and so it became VERY IMPORTANT to finish this one instead. Sigh. But I'm glad I did; it's an odd little piece, but I like it.
> 
> Pairing withheld mainly so I could have a bit of fun with the reader (hopefully) not immediately knowing the identity of the narrator. This _is_ supposed to be a mystery, after all.
> 
> All feedback heartily welcomed, here or at [my Livejournal](http://pommederis.livejournal.com/2566.html). Cheers!


End file.
